Responsive WordPress Theme for Churches

This church theme for WordPress has the features a church website needs
— a mobile-friendly responsive design, sermon archive, photo and video gallery, church events (recurring), support for multiple locations, staff profiles and church news.
The sermon archive is complete with the ability for visitors to search for audio, video and text sermons by category, tag, date and speaker. Sermon podcasting is built-in.
Risen has a Retina-ready design and powerful customization options that make it easy to change the theme’s colors, fonts and background.

Risen is also useful for non-church websites that need rich multimedia publishing capabilities for audio, video and photos and that want to promote events.
The sermon archive can be fully renamed using the theme options,
making this a WordPress theme not only for churches but also parachurch ministries, nonprofits and charities, conference websites and multimedia presentation archives.

This theme is well-documented with about 50 pages of organized, easy to follow instructions explaining how to use its features.
Additionally, a series of video guides is included and support is provided.

“I have to say I’m very impressed with your theme.
It has made building the current site I’m on as easy as possible…
I really wish all themes were built like this one.
You did a phenomenal job of making everything customizable in the way it should be!”
— Brent Barkley

“This theme was extremely easy to use and the documentation that came with it was a huge help…The couple of questions I had were answered very quickly and efficiently.
I would definitely recommend any theme by this author.”
— duncan99

“I love risen!
It has been easy to set up and looks really great...
much better than what I had been using.”
— Pastor Eric Atkins

”...looks great on my phone and tablet.
Steven included all the features you would want in a theme designed for churches.”
— wpforministry.com (Nick Blevins)

For more, see What People Are Saying at the bottom of this page.

Mobile-friendly Responsive and Retina-ready Design

The Risen church theme was designed to be responsive. In other words, it is mobile-friendly and will adapt itself to fit comfortably on devices with small screens such as phones and tablets.
Scan the QR code below with your mobile device for a live demonstration. Risen is also a Retina-ready theme so it looks extra sharp on the newest high resolution displays.

Highly Customizable Colors, Fonts and Background

Risen was made to be easy to customize to match your church branding from within the WordPress admin area.
You can choose between a Light or Dark appearance, set a Main Color, link color, change fonts (200+ Google Web Fonts preloaded) and choose from 19 Preset Backgrounds, some of which can be colored (or provide your own).
It is also easy to Upload Your Logo.
None of this requires editing code.

Sermons in Audio, Video and Text Format (Podcasting Too)

Put your pastor’s sermons online in audio (listen online or download MP3), video (YouTube or Vimeo), online text or downloadable PDF format.
This theme provides a robust multimedia archive in which sermons can be organized and browsed by category, tag, speaker, month, day and year.
Support for sermon podcasting was added in version 2.0. You can podcast your sermons on iTunes.

Photo & Video Gallery

Share your church photos and videos using the theme’s gallery features.
Create multiple “albums” by organizing your photos and videos into categories.

Church Events (Recurring)

Keep your congregation and community in the know about what will be happening by posting events.
Events can include dates, times, address, Google Map and other information.
You can set events to repeat weekly, monthly or yearly with an optional end date.
This is great for weekly services and other regularly scheduled events.

More Church Website Features

In addition to sermon multimedia, photos and events, Risen has features for posting Church News (blog), Staff Profiles, support for multiple Locations, and a Contact Form that can be configured with multiple recipients for the visitor to choose from (e.g. Church Office, Senior Pastor, Youth Pastor, etc.).

Complete Feature List

Responsive design using HTML5 and CSS3 styling

The design is Retina-ready for super sharp appearance on high resolution displays

Sample Content (XML) similar to live preview included — just import it

Sample Widgets can be imported as well (instructions included)

Well-commented HTML, CSS, JavaScript and PHP code

Getting Support

If you have a question that is not answered in the Documentation or the FAQ, or if you discover a problem,
you can submit a support request via the Contact Form in order to receive a response by email.
Please provide a URL showing an issue if necessary.

My goal is to answer questions within 24 hours on weekdays (excluding US holidays and rare travel).

Please Note:

Support is limited to questions regarding the theme’s features or problems with the theme. Support is not offered for code customizations, third-party plugins or WordPress issues unrelated to the theme.

Support questions posted in comments on ThemeForest will not be answered. Instead, you will be asked to submit your question via the contact form so an email conversation can be started.

Changelog

The current version is 2.1.1 (June 15, 2015) — 23rd update. View the Changelog.

What People Are Saying

Here is some feedback from users of Risen and other WordPress or church website experts.
Five stars have been placed by those who have mentioned that they rated the theme as such here ThemeForest.

“I have to say I’m very impressed with your theme.
It has made building the current site I’m on as easy as possible…
I really wish all themes were built like this one.
You did a phenomenal job of making everything customizable in the way it should be!”
— Brent Barkley

“This theme was extremely easy to use and the documentation that came with it was a huge help…The couple of questions I had were answered very quickly and efficiently.
I would definitely recommend any theme by this author.”
— duncan99

“I love risen!
It has been easy to set up and looks really great...
much better than what I had been using.”
— Pastor Eric Atkins

“Easy to use and exactly what a church needs! Thanks Steve!”
— Tim Dunnington

“A fantastic looking theme that is a breeze to set up with excellent documentation. 7 out of 5 stars. Highly recommended.”
— simian1701

“This is a perfect theme for building a church website- I have little to no experience in building a website and yet found the layout and construction easy to follow and customize.
Also, the creator is easy to contact and provides personal help, which is a huge benefit to purchasing this theme.
And for anyone looking to build a site in another language, I built mine in Spanish and it’s working great!”
— Pastor Jason Boyle

“Loved your Risen Theme! Thanks so much for the excellent support documentation/videos, I’m brand new to this, and you made it almost too easy!”
— Pastor Chad Cohoon

“I absolutely love your theme and have had fun playing with it to build my new site.”
— baharte

“Just want to say that your documentation is outstanding. Just started using WordPress and I felt like a pro with your great instructions.”
— Elena Rivera MacGregor

“Thanks for developing such a great theme for churches! We love that Risen is responsive, which is only increasing our engagement and reach!”
— elementdave

“Really superb theme! I love the attention to detail and…the support after the sale. Nice work!”
— Dave Knadler

“I wasn’t sure I’d be able to design a professional looking website on my own, but you made the process so straightforward — especially thanks to your easy to follow video tutorials.”
— Tori Hogan

“I’m impressed by the work behind this theme. Coding, documentation, it is near perfection. I gave it the five stars it deserved.”
— Ketavine

“Our new church website using the Risen theme is now online and the congregation is delighted with the results, both in terms of appearance and usefulness. It suits our requirements just right. The support along the way has also been beyond expectations.”
— Thor Kvist

“Your documentation and videos are super!
I’m so impressed.
Worked with another theme but documentation was minimal…thanks for giving us a great product.”
— mogulbear

”...thank you for designing such an awesome theme, coding it well, and providing such a great, extensively detailed support documentation page.”
— Chimpie

“This is the best wordpress theme I have ever worked with! Great job.”
— sporez

“I purchased this theme for my church’s website and had it up and functioning within a day.
This is by far the best “church related” theme out there!
The support is awesome! Thanks Steven and team.”
— jordan0109

“I love this theme, looks great from the front and works great from the back. ”
— Zerojosh

“If you are looking for a church theme, Risen by @stevengliebe is a very beautiful option!”
— @WPExplorer in tweet to 30,000 followers

“This theme is amazing, and the help that you provide is awesome! I have never been happier with a theme purchase”
— FamilyBaptist

“I just wanted to let you know that I love your Risen theme! This was my first attempt at putting up a website, and I was able to do it without any custom code. ”
— Gary LaRoy

“Risen is incredibly easy to use yet provides almost unlimited ability to customize a site every which way you can imagine.
... The documentation is extensive yet easy to understand and the support for the theme is top-notch.”
— Owen Wollum

“Just wanted to say that this is one of the nicest and most complete templates I have ever used! It is so easy to configure. Thanks for the great work!”
— hize213

“I am happy to have received such great customer service with this theme!”
— pdiddy2aop

“Could not be happier with this theme! It looks great, is easily customizable, and offers the power and flexibility to fit every need we’ve had so far. Add in excellent documentation and very responsive support, and Risen is a real winner! ... easily worth more than the asking price.”
— mjpatey

“You took the fear out of tackling a website creation. Thanks for making it easy.”
— Patti Spencer, Kempsville Baptist Church

“I just wanted to say how great this theme is. I’ve never used a theme that was this well put together.”
— DittoBox

”...this is probably the most well thought out theme I’ve ever bought on ThemeForest. I’m a web designer of 7 years and this theme is a joy to work with. The ideas behind customisation etc are excellent. So is the documentation. Brilliant work.”
— kelechi

Sources & Credits

Much appreciation is given to the people behind these helpful projects and resources used in making the theme and live preview.

You can use HostingReviews.io to find a web host. Shared and managed WordPress hosting are common choices.

As of writing (October 2, 2014), ThemeForest does not require authors to provide support. I do provide support for free. While there is no time limit on this support, in the interest of sustainability, I reserve the right to put one in place (optionally extendable). ThemeForest is likely to facilitate this.